


Edge

by Medeafic



Series: Supernova [14]
Category: Star Trek RPF
Genre: Angst, Asphyxiation/breath control play discussion, M/M, Mentions of Violence, manipulative behaviour/dub-con
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-02-22
Updated: 2011-02-22
Packaged: 2017-10-15 20:52:54
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,137
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/164838
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Medeafic/pseuds/Medeafic
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Zach is back.  Chris is angry.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Edge

**Author's Note:**

> **NB: This chapter contains scenes that might be considered dub-con. Please feel free to message me if you'd prefer to know more before reading the chapter.**

“Are you fucking kidding me?” Chris stares at Zach, wobbling in the doorway, and wishes he’d thought to pull on a shirt before opening the door. Zach is having a hard time keeping his eyes on Chris’s face.

Zach rubs a hand over his mouth, uncoordinated. “Hi. I’m drunk.”

“Yeah.”

“I’m sorry.”

Chris stares at him, at an inebriated Zach whose eyes still can’t quite meet his, and whose expression keeps flickering between guilt, lust and hope. “You’re sorry,” Chris repeats.

“I’m sorry I’m drunk and I’m sorry for what happened. Before. At the play. Very, very sorry.” He enunciates each word with deliberateness, as though vowels and consonants are sliding away from him.

Suddenly the torpor overcomes Chris again; the drained, empty feeling that he fought so hard to get rid of. He’s been better lately, happier, even if he can’t help making pointed comments in interviews about how he’s dating women. At least it elicits strong approval from his publicist. And Chris pretends it’s all for his career.

“Can I come in?”

“Go away, Zach,” Chris says wearily. “Fuck off back to wherever you’re staying, and sleep it off. I don’t have fucking time for this.”

“You know, you were really cute when you were saying fudge instead,” Zach slurs. He stumbles backwards, and Chris moves forward to grab him, worried that he’s going to do an accidental back flip over the stairs. “We should do that again.”

“How much did you _drink_?”

“Not sure. More than I meant to. I probably shouldn’t have asked if you wanted to –”

“I’m going to call you a taxi.”

“Please don’t.” Zach is clutching onto him desperately by the bare shoulders, drooping in Chris’s arms like an unwatered flower. Chris wishes again that he’d taken the time to pull a shirt on before opening the door. Zach’s hands are cold on his flesh. “I need to talk to you.”

“You want to _talk_? Please. That’s not what this is.” His mouth curls in disgust.

Zach is sliding now, and Chris has to prop him up, too close, his breath hot and pungent with whisky. Chris turns his head and looks out over the stairs.

“Yes, talk. I have to talk to you.”

“But I don’t have to talk to you, Zach. Not if I don’t want to. And I don’t.” If it goes on, Chris realizes, he’s going to be cruel, say things just to cut, and he’s a better person than that. Or he’d like to think he is.

Besides, Zach might not remember it in the morning, and if he’s going to be an asshole to Zach, by God Chris definitely wants him to remember it.

“I’m really sorry,” Zach babbles. “Please don’t call a taxi.”

At the very least, Chris knows, he’s going to have to dump Zach on the couch while he makes the call, because he can’t leave him sprawled on the floor out here.

Well. He _could_.

“Christopher, I know I –”

“Jesus _Christ_ , Zach, just – move. Inside. Stop talking to me, I don’t want to hear it. And _don’t_ call me Christopher.”

Zach’s eyes go very wide, and he closes his lips together tightly. Chris half-drags him into the apartment and deposits him on the couch in a tumble of limbs.

“Stay there.” The phone is in his bedroom. But when he turns from the nightstand to the doorway again, Zach is slumped against the wall outside. “What are you doing? I told you –”

“I’m sorry,” Zach says quietly, and he sounds totally sober in that moment. “Chris, I’m so, so –”

“Where are you staying? With Joe?”

“Why?”

“So I can give the address to the fucking taxi.”

“I’m not going to tell you,” Zach says, and folds his arms. He starts sliding sideways and has to grab at the wall.

Chris pushes past him but Zach follows him down the corridor again into the lounge, talking. “Please would you –”

“No.”

“But Christopher –”

“ _Do not call me that_ ,” Chris snarls, whirling around abruptly. “Sit on the fucking couch and wait for me to call a taxi and _don’t speak to me_.”

Zach sits immediately, his face pale even in the warm light from the floor lamp. They stare at each other for a second, and then Chris turns to leave.

“Where are you going?” Zach sounds forlorn.

“Kitchen.”

“Why?”

“Because I can’t fucking _look_ at you.”

Chris paces the kitchen tiles in the dark for a few minutes, feeling shaky. He tries to call the taxi but his fingers are trembling and he keeps hitting the wrong buttons, partly because he can’t see them properly, and partly because his brain is still stuck on the fact that Zach is sitting in the other room. And Chris is furious again, like he was the night they broke up, and tired. So tired.

“Please don’t call a cab.”

The guy won’t quit. Zach has followed him to the kitchen now and looks – is it fear? It’s hard to tell. Zach is haloed in light from the lounge behind him.

“Did I or did I not tell you to stay on the couch?”

“I’m sorry, I –”

“You keep saying _sorry_ like it’s supposed to _mean_ something!” Chris shouts. “It doesn’t matter what you _say_ , what matters is what you _do_.” His voice reverberates around the room, and he sees Zach flinch.

He holds up conciliatory hands. “I know. I know that. I’m trying to –”

“What you’re _doing_ is getting smashed and coming round for a quick fuck.” Chris wishes with all his soul that the thought of sleeping with Zach was anathema to him, but even like this, drunk, and after everything, Chris still feels that spark. The attraction. He thinks fleetingly about giving in to it, letting Zach into his bed and afterwards, telling him to get out. Telling him that he’ll never have anything this good again. Breaking Zach as thoroughly and completely as he possibly can. It would be only what he deserves.

“No, it wasn’t supposed to be like this! When I thought it out, it went differently.”

“Yeah, I’m sure. In your head you were balls-deep by now.” It’s like the last week or two, feeling better, the pain lessening, the memories fading a little – they’re swept aside. All Chris wants to do right now is hurt. Hurt _Zach_.

“No, not that, I wasn’t thinking that! Well – no, I mean, I –” Zach bites his lip. “It was different. I wasn’t so drunk. And you yelled more at first and tried to get away from me less. You weren’t so obviously repulsed by me.” He comes into the room, snaps on the light. “Hey – what happened to your face?”

It’s been a while since Jake, but Chris still has a slight blue shadow under his eye, and a pink, healing cut on his nose.

Zach comes forward, frowning, and blinking his eyes like he’s trying to focus them again. “And there. You’re bruised.” It’s the place where Jake punched him in the gut, still yellow and brown. Chris can see the moment Zach starts to think it, that he’s been playing with someone else. The broken-hearted look that crosses his face only makes Chris want to wound him more.

So he leans back against the bench top, pushing his chest out and looks straight at Zach, like he’s proud of the marks.

Zach moves forward, tentative.

“Stop.” Chris hisses the word, and Zach stops. “If you take another step, I am going to physically throw you out of this apartment. I have a nice level of balance in my life right now, and _you_ are upsetting it. So either I can call you a taxi, or you just get out now and find your own way home. Your choice.”

Zach gets a calculating look on his face and shrugs. “Okay. Call a taxi. You were right, I’m staying at Joe’s.”

“This is so you get five extra minutes, isn’t it? Before I kick you out.”

“Yes.”

“And are you going to come back again tomorrow, hung over, and try again?”

“Yes.”

Chris puts his cell down on the kitchen bench carefully and leans up against the cupboards. “Fine. Say what you have to say and then get out.”

Zach takes a deep breath. “Can we go lie – _sit_ ,” he amends quickly at the sight of Chris’s face. “Christ. I didn’t mean that, it was just habit.” He passes a hand over his eyes. “Can we sit down, maybe?”

Chris feels an almost overwhelming urge to disagree with everything Zach asks him to do, but he takes a second. The quicker it’s over, the quicker he can get back to his own life and forget. So he follows Zach, who’s getting a little steadier on his feet, back into the lounge and watches him collapse on the couch like a water balloon.

“I need to think for a minute,” Zach mutters. “Please.” After a stretched silence, he says, “I was wrong.”

Chris doesn’t reply.

“I was being a total asshole that night, and I’m sor- I want to make it up to you.”

Chris looks at him. He’s messy, his eyebrows all shagged up and his eyes red. There are splotches on his neck, which Chris thinks for one horrible moment are hickeys, and if they were – but then he realizes it’s just the mottled flush Zach gets when he’s under stress.

“I don’t think you can make it up to me.” It’s the plain truth.

“But you have to let me try. Please.”

“I don’t _have_ to let you do anything, Zach. In fact, I think I’ve let you do more than enough. You always get your own way, and I always give in to whatever you want, but this time, no. This time I’m done. I’ve found my limit with you.”

“But I’m going to therapy and –”

“Zach, I don’t care. Okay? I don’t care what you’re doing. I don’t want to know what amazing self-insights you’ve come to. You’ve worn me out.”

“But that’s why I stayed away so long. Because I know you need time to get over things, you’re not like me, you need more time –”

“There is not enough time in the world for me to get over what you said that night. And if you think I’m going to believe you’ve been ignoring me for months _for my own good_ , wow, you must be out of your mind.”

“Of course there were other reasons,” Zach says quietly. “I didn’t know what to say, how to talk to you about it. I was ashamed of myself. I still am. Because I know now, I get it, you weren’t doing what I said, and I _am_ sorry –” He breaks off and looks at Chris, but Chris still can’t look at him. “I _know_ I fucked up. I know that _I’m_ fucked up.” He’s pleading now, Chris realizes with satisfaction. “But maybe if I can really understand why I do the things I do – why are you laughing?”

Chris can’t help himself. It’s bitter, spiteful laughter, and he’s pleased to see Zach look mortified. “You know what? Your sadistic tendencies are the _least_ of your problems.” Zach goes quiet and still, and Chris keeps spitting out words. “You’re selfish and stubborn. Arrogant. Inflexible. You can’t keep a relationship together because you’re an asshole, but that doesn’t have anything to do with the way you fuck. You’re just a goddamn mess.”

Zach is clutching at the sofa seat, his knuckles white. “Thank you for the criticism,” he says, and Chris thinks he’s being sarcastic until he looks at his face. “My therapist suggested that this week, instead of brushing off criticisms, I should say thank you and think about it for a while.”

 _I don’t care_ , Chris wants to say, but he’s curious. He makes sure his tone is cynical enough before asking, “And how’s that working out for you?”

“It’s not exactly pleasant,” Zach admits with a brief, pained smile. “If I’d realized I was going to end up here, I might have put it off for another week.”

“What _are_ you doing here?” Chris asks. “I mean, in LA?”

Zach rubs hand over his short hair and looks embarrassed. “I came to see you. I _did_ stay away because I thought you would want me to, but I couldn’t do it anymore – you never called so I…” He trails off at the sight of Chris’s incredulous face. “Okay, I fucked that one up too. I get that now. I should have tried to talk to you before now. I realize that I didn’t handle things well and I regret it, more that I can say. My therapist said…he said it might be a good thing, if I tried to talk to you. Apologize. But it doesn’t seem like a good thing so far.”

“Did your therapist also tell you to get wasted before you came over?”

“No,” Zach groans. “I thought that one up all by myself.”

Chris tips his head back to look at the ceiling. He can’t think about Zach, so he thinks about his apartment instead. He likes his apartment. It’s anchored him for many years, but he’s been thinking lately that maybe he should buy a place. Buy a house. Make a home. Be a grown-up.

“You left me,” he says to the white expanse above him. “You didn’t call me, you didn’t email. You continued on with your life, going out to parties and working and seeing friends. You let everyone else think that I was the one who broke it off. The way you did that, all of it, was genuinely cruel, Zach. That was a surprise to me, because I really didn’t think you had that in you. I guess I know better now, right?” _And I need to buy a new sofa. And a new bed. I’m thirty years old now, it’s time to sort out my shit._

He still can’t look at Zach, but his neck is getting sore, so he looks to the side, at the TV instead. He can see Zach reflected in it, still and slumped.

“I would do anything in the whole world to take it back,” Zach says, his voice hoarse. “You could – you could cut me again, if that would help.”

“It wouldn’t help.”

“You could do something else. Whatever you want. I mean it – I would do _anything_ if we could fix this.”

Chris studies the coffee table next. He’s had it since Berkeley, inherited from a friend of a friend who was moving out and didn’t have room for it in his new place. It’s covered in marks – rings from too-hot coffee cups and black cigarette burns and gouges in the wood. “I don’t want to do anything to you.”

Chris remains virtually scar-free despite the cuts and burns and bites. Zach’s after care has always been excellent. But in this moment, it feels like the coffee table is Chris’s modern version of Dorian Gray’s portrait. _I should put it out of its misery. Maybe something glass-topped instead_.

He says, “You told me, a long time ago, that the pain was not for punishment. And you made sure that was clear again when we did that trial.”

Zach sits up. “We should never have –”

“ _I_ am talking.” Chris gives Zach one quick, furious glare, and he subsides on the couch again. “So I don’t know why you think I would want to hurt you now. The pain stuff – those were acts of love between us, and that’s gone now. So, really, Zach. I have no idea why you would think I’d want to do that with you.”

He hears Zach’s sharp intake of breath, and watches as his hands convulse around the sofa seat again. After a moment, he looks up into Zach’s face. His eyes are filling with tears.

“Don’t you…” Zach trails off. The tears are spilling over slowly now, and Chris has never seen him cry, not like this. Silent, despairing. After a few minutes, while Chris looks everywhere but at Zach’s face, he says, “I know I hurt you, but I didn’t think it was so bad that – I mean I hoped…”

“You hoped that I still loved you.”

“Yes,” Zach whispers.

“And you hoped that I would forgive you and take you back.”

“Yes.”

Chris stands up. He can’t look at those tears anymore. They’re making him _feel_ things, and he doesn’t want to, he can’t. He has his self-preservation to think about. “Well, hope is a cruel thing, Zach. Like you.”

Zach doesn’t move from the sofa, so Chris keeps talking. “You want to know what I did while you were gone? Do you want to know who I fucked, who I played with?”

“I don’t have any right to ask.” What he means, Chris knows, is _I don’t want to hear_.

“I tried different things, and I experimented. Because you never wanted me to know too much, you never wanted to let me meet anyone else, you never –”

“It wasn’t like that,” Zach says defensively. “That’s not what it was like, that’s not how I meant it to be.”

“No ‘thanks for the criticism’ this time? Of course not, that’s just lip service. Do you know what I did, because I didn’t have anyone else around to even _talk_ to about this stuff? I found some guy online, and I went round to his house, and I undressed for him – no, don’t you fucking dare move, you are going to listen to every word of this. I undressed for him, like I used to do with you, Zach. And he hit me in the face with a cane, and punched me, here, where the mark still is. You understand what I’m telling you?”

Zach looks dazed.

“And you know what happened then?” Chris pauses. He wants Zach to imagine every terrible thing that might have gone down, just like Chris did in those moments. “I kicked him and I ran. It was mostly luck. But if I hadn’t run, I don’t know how it would have ended.”

“Who was he?” Zach’s voice is distant and polite.

“I’m not going to tell you, because it doesn’t matter.”

“Tell me his name.” Chris sees it then, the predatory, scary flash across Zach’s face, and it’s exactly what he wanted.

“I am not a fucking damsel in distress. And you are not a knight in shining armor. You’re the bad guy in this story, Zach.”

“He _hurt_ you!”

“Yes. _You_ hurt me, too. At least these cuts and bruises will fade with time. I don’t know if I’ll ever get over what happened between us. What you said that night, it was inexcusable.” He can hear Zach’s breathing, shallow and rapid. “You can get out now. And don’t come back.”

  
***

  
Chris goes to bed, and lies there awake for hours. The anger has returned, thick and suffocating when he turns off the light, so he leaves on the reading lamp and hopes for sleep. Midnight comes and goes. By two-thirty, he decides that sleep is not going to happen, so he gets up instead and prowls around his apartment in the dark. After half an hour of that, he feels trapped, and decides to go out somewhere. He dresses haphazardly.

As soon as he opens the door, he jumps at the sight of a silhouetted figure, slumped against the railing opposite. It’s Zach, his knees drawn up into his chest and his arms wrapped around them. His head is resting on his knees, and Chris thinks for a moment that he’s asleep.

“What the _fuck_ , man?”

Zach raises his head slightly, but doesn’t look at him.

“It’s three in the morning!”

“I meant to go.” Hs voice is scratchy. “I was just going to sit here for a minute. I didn’t realize how long I stayed.”

Chris leans against the door frame. “You always had a flair for the dramatic. For fuck’s sake, Zach, go home.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Stop saying that, it’s meaningless.”

Zach looks up at him, his face half-shadowed. “Do you remember that time you tried to hit me, and you left your keys at my place and I came over and you were sitting here, in your own doorway?”

Chris gives a brief shrug. “What about it?”

“I gave you a second chance.”

“That was different.”

“You called me a psychopath.”

 _Fuck.  
_  
“You called me a psychopath but I still gave you a chance to explain.”

“I don’t owe you anything.”

“Give me a chance, that’s all I’m asking for. Please. I’m begging you. I’ll do _anything_. Anything you want.”

Chris can hear Zach start to get teary again, and that won’t work. He feels the anger flare, embraces it. “Jesus Christ. I _am_ insane. Alright. Get up.”

Zach gracelessly struggles to his feet, and Chris has to look away from the hope in his eyes.

“You can come inside. Sit on the couch and _don’t move_ , and I’ll bring you a coffee and then – then maybe we can work something out. Maybe there’s something you can do.”

“Oh, my God, thank you, I promise I won’t move, I’ll –”

“Be quiet. Please. Stop talking.”

Zach nods.

He seems to have sobered up. Knowing Zach, Chris thinks, he only had a few drinks anyway. He’s always been a bit of a lightweight, because he never plays under the influence. It’s never even been on the radar before tonight. And Zach always likes to play, so he doesn’t drink often around Chris, and rarely to excess.

He always likes to play.

Chris makes him some coffee, and a ham sandwich. Zach is obviously determined to be good, because there are no sanctimonious inquiries about whether the ham is organic, much less the mustard. He wolfs it down and drains the coffee, and then looks at Chris, eager and expectant.

But Chris is still not ready, not yet.

“Go take a shower. And soak your clothes, man. Seriously. I think you spilled more scotch _on_ you than you drank.”

“I don’t have anything else to wear.” He’s hesitant, a little on guard.

“There are towels.” Chris waves his hand. They look at each other for a moment, and then Zach shrugs.

“Sure. Okay. I’ll shower.”

Chris argues with himself while the shower runs.

 _This is a bad decision. These are bad things that you want to do._

 _Maybe. But it’s not Jake-levels of bad._

 _That makes it better?  
_  
He promised the doctor he wouldn’t do anything for three months. But that was dating, and this – this is different. He justifies it to himself even as he feels guilty. This is different, because this is Zach, and Chris deserves some kind of payback. He thinks momentarily about what the doctor might say to that and pushes the thought aside with a shiver.

“This is _different_ ,” he says aloud, insistent.

“What do you mean?” Zach has come out of the shower, clad only in a towel and his Aum necklace, still damp in some places, like he’s given himself the most peremptory drying possible. “Different in a good way?” He’s so trusting, it makes Chris draw back again from the hot rage burning in his core.

He’s thinner, Chris notices. A lot thinner.

The towel hangs low on his hips, so low that Chris is sure his cock is the only thing keeping it up right now, and then he sees it – the stylized star in Zach’s tattoo, peeking out from behind the white cotton. The Pole Star. The one Zach said was supposed to represent him.

The fury explodes inside him like a blinding light and Zach can see it in his face, he knows, because he takes a step backwards.

“You want to make things better? You want to _fix_ things?” Chris walks towards him, clutching his hands into fists so hard that his blunt nails are gouging skin.

“Yes. Yes, I do.” Zach retreats to the wall, looking wary.

Chris has never wanted to make him hurt so badly in his whole life. Not even that night he tried to hit him. Not even when he was cutting into him. Not even after _Inishmore_ , when Zach was saying cruel, hateful things.

They are both breathing heavily now, and Chris is right in his face, pushing his forehead up against Zach’s, and holding him against the wall by the shoulders.

“There is one thing you can do,” he tells Zach. “One thing.”

“Name it.” He can see fear in Zach’s eyes, and he knows what it is. Fear that Chris will want to cut him, or hit him, or God forbid, _fuck_ him. “I’ll let you do whatever you want.”

Chris kisses him then, hard, their teeth grinding against each other and he tastes blood, his own or Zach’s he doesn’t know. And toothpaste. Zach brushed his teeth.

“I don’t want to do anything to you,” Chris pants, pulling away. “I want _you_ to do this to _me_.” He grabs Zach’s hands and pulls them up to his own face, covering over his nose and mouth. There is blood on Zach’s lip, and he licks it away nervously.

“That’s – I can’t do that. Not right now.”

Chris pulls the hands away so he can speak, and sees blood on Zach’s palm from his mouth. Okay. So Chris is the one bleeding. “It’s now or never. Put your money where your mouth is, _Zachary_.” Zach closes his eyes. “Or you can get out. It’s your choice.”

“I don’t understand.”

“You don’t have to understand. This is what I want. And you know, if I really wanted to make things difficult for you, I’d ask you to actually choke me. But you said this way was safer.”

“But _why_?”

“Ever since we started this thing I have _trusted_ you no matter what, and I don’t know if I do anymore. And if I don’t trust you, I can’t be with you. So are you in or are you out?”

It’s not the only reason. There are too many of them, all jumbled up in each other – Chris wants it because he’s angry, because he’s sad, because he misses Zach’s hands on him and the sense of magic and wonder that Zach brings with him. Chris wants it because it’s dangerous and edgy and unsafe. But most of all he wants it because Zach _owes_ him, and he knows Zach doesn’t want to give this to him, not now, not like this. And it will hurt Zach to do it.

“I’ve been drinking,” Zach says. He’s getting desperate.

“You’re sober enough now.”

“This was something…I wanted to do this differently. It was supposed to be about –”

“Stop making excuses. Do you want me or not?”

“I always want you.”

“Then either do it or don’t do it. Okay, fine, you’re not doing it. You can borrow some clothes if you like, so you’re not running naked around the streets of Silver Lake. I’ll go get some for you.” Chris makes as if to walk away, and Zach grabs his wrist.

“Alright. I’ll do it. But I want to ask one question first. Please.”

“I don’t know, Zach.” Chris pretends to think about it. “You don’t like it when _I_ ask questions.”

“Please.” He’s so pensive that it stops up Chris’s anger for a moment. Just a moment.

“What is it?”

“Do you really think that doing this, doing it _now_ , I mean, is a healthy thing for a future relationship between us?” Later, Chris reflects that if Zach had left it there, he probably would have stopped then and said, _You know what, you’re right, I’m just trying to get back at you._ But Zach continued. “Because I don’t think my therapist would say it’s healthy. One time he told me –”

“Zach, I swear to God, if you say the word ‘therapist’ again tonight, we’re through.”

Zach stops abruptly. “Okay.”

“And, yeah. Sure. I think it’s healthy enough. We always had a twisted kind of relationship, right?”

Zach lets his wrist drop and lifts a hand to Chris’s face. “But I don’t want our relationship to be twisted, Christopher. I want it to be –”

Chris jerks his face away. “I answered your question. Are we doing this?”

“I’ll do whatever you want. I told you I’d do anything, and I meant it.” Chris can see hope written all over Zach’s face, but he turns away, pulling Zach by the hand.

“Come on, then. Come and play.”

  
***

  
It’s too familiar and not at all, because for the first time since Chris cut him, Zach is naked first and Chris is still clothed, pulling him onto the bed. But he doesn’t stay covered up for long, as Zach lays out his long, too-thin form next to him and plucks at buttons. His fingers are as clever as ever, trailing down Chris’s skin and pinching occasionally like he’s set on autopilot.

 _I have never had this kind of sex before_ , Chris thinks. There’s been apathy sex and are-we-going-to-stay-friends sex and angry sex, but never something like this, where he’s pleased to see pain mixed with the want in Zach’s eyes when he pulls him down to kiss. It’s like nothing he’s felt before. And it’s nothing good.

“Tell me about it,” Chris says into Zach’s clavicle. “Tell me how you saw it when you were planning it.”

Zach has already pulled Chris’s jeans down, is rubbing in an encouraging fashion at his cock, trying to get him out of his boxer briefs.

“Not like this.”

“How? Tell me.” Zach finally gets the briefs down and Chris feels the terrycloth of the towel rubbing against his dick. He’s hard, getting harder. Chris rolls them over and pulls at the towel, slides on top of Zach so that they lie flush together, fitting together in familiar patterns like the cogs of a clock. Chris props himself up on an elbow and looks at Zach.

He’s so serious-looking, his eyes somber and thoughtful.

“Tell me how you thought about it. I want to do it that way. Was I tied up?”

“No.”

“Then what?”

“I was on top.”

Chris pulls at him and rolls until Zach is on top of him. “And what else?”

“What does it matter? It’s not exactly how I thought it would be. Can we just –”

“No. No, no, no. You tell me how you thought about it and we’ll try to do it that way.” He knows he’s digging in, pushing down on the tender spot and making it hurt, because Zach is clearly troubled.

“This isn’t for me. This is for you. We’ll do it however you want it.”

“I want to do it the way you thought about it,” Chris insists. Zach starts kissing him, and Chris pushes him away. “Don’t try to _distract_ me –”

“When I thought it out, I kissed you like that. I made sure you were nice and hard for me. And then I knelt over you and used my hand to stop you breathing.” Zach’s voice is quiet. “I was going to ask you to jack yourself. I wanted to watch your face while I did it. Safer, that way.”

“Oh.”

Zach changes, becomes business-like. “You need a safe signal. You won’t be able to talk. So you need to be able to tell me to stop if necessary. Remember sometimes when I gagged you, we had a ball – do you have anything like that, something you can drop?” Chris shrugs. “Or can you snap your fingers?”

“Yeah. I can tie my own shoelaces too.”

For a moment, the world spins, and they grin at each other. It’s like before, when they could snark at each other or banter in the middle of everything and it was just what they did, how they showed affection. And the pain was how they showed love.

“Well, if you want to stop, snap your fingers, preferably in my face so I can’t miss it.”

“I’ll do my best.”

“Good boy.” Zach smiles again.

But Chris hears the tone of approval in his voice and it makes him angry again, instantly.

Zach’s eyes change shape, from crinkled-happy to worried-sad. He shifts slightly so he has access, and begins to stroke at Chris’s dick. He drops his head into Chris’s shoulder, and Chris feels him breathing hot against his skin. “I missed you so much.” Chris doesn’t reply. “I’ll make this so good for you, and as safe as I can, I promise. I love you.”

“Please don’t say that, not right now. Please.”

Zach’s hand falters on his cock, and Chris regrets his words instantly. “You can bite me if you like.”

“I’d like that. Would you like that?”

“Yes.”

When Zach bites into him gently, Chris feels his eyes prickle with tears, but forces them back. Zach takes his time, longer than Chris thinks is really necessary, biting and tugging and making him gasp, until the anger inside him is a molten lava flow running through his whole body.

“Now. Do it now.”

Zach pushes Chris down and straddles him, on his hands and knees so that their faces are inches away. Chris can see everything on Zach’s face – love, fear, lust, doubt.

 _If you make him do this, it really will be the end between you.  
_  
“Touch yourself. Jack your dick for me,” Zach says, and Chris does. His hand hits Zach’s heavy cock as well, bouncing it, but Zach is unmoved. He waits until Chris’s breathing has accelerated before he looks straight at him. “I’m doing this for you. Because I love you, and I want to show you that I love you and that I’m sorry.”

Chris closes his eyes. He can’t look anymore. “Do it.”

 _Is this fair? Is this really fair to him? To either of you?  
_  
Zach strokes his hand over Chris’s shoulder, tender over the bites, and down towards his dick. He traces the outline of the bruise Jake left on Chris’s midsection. Chris feels fingertips coming up, running over his chest, up his neck, brushing over his mouth–

His eyes snap open and he grabs Zach’s wrist, hard. They stare at each other.

“This isn’t right,” Chris blurts out.

“But you said –”

“Enterprise.”

Zach is frozen for about three seconds before he rolls off, and struggles off the bed. Chris sits up and watches him, horrified. It’s like Zach can’t see properly; he stumbles into a wall and slides down it, all the way to the floor, his too-thin frame collapsing in on itself. The worst thing is the way he cups a hand over his face, pushed into the plaster, so that Chris can’t see his expression at all.

“Zach.” Chris drags himself off the bed and crawls over to him. “Zach – I just couldn’t.”

Zach doesn’t say anything.

“I’m sorry?” Chris tries. “I know I was –”

“I’ll go. Just give me a minute.” His voice is muffled, and Chris can barely hear him.

“No, you don’t have to go.” He pulls at Zach until he can see his face, and then wishes that he hadn’t. He’s never seen Zach look so destroyed.

Zach says, “I should never have agreed to this.”

Chris feels ill. For a horrible second he’s sure he’s going to have to turn away and puke all over his own carpet, because it hits him, hard, exactly what this game of revenge has cost. He’s pushed beyond Zach’s limit again without even thinking about how it might affect him.

“Jesus Christ. Zach, listen – it’s okay. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have asked you to do that.”

“You’re sorry?” Zach blinks, like he doesn’t understand the words.

Chris pulls him, determined, until they can hug, Zach’s mouth pressed into his neck and Chris’s arms tight around him. “You were right, you were right – this wasn’t a healthy idea. I’m sorry, I’m sorry.”

Zach says something completely unintelligible and Chris pulls him back, presses his face into Zach’s. “What?”

“You said that saying sorry was meaningless.”

“Jesus fuck,” Chris breathes. “Don’t listen to me. I don’t know anything. I don’t know what I’m talking about.”

“I should go.”

“I don’t want you to go.”

“I just wanted to make things up to you.”

“I know. Wait. Wait here. You’re cold.”

Chris is too worried to think about his own nakedness, but he stops dead halfway across the room when Zach says, “Christopher. What. Is. That?”

He half turns, sees Zach staring at his bare ass. His bare _ZQ_ ’d ass. “You know what it is.”

“Why is it still there? It’s been months.”

“It should have faded off,” Chris agrees. “It…didn’t yet.” He keeps moving, gets a tee and some yoga pants that he thinks are probably Zach’s anyway, because they’ve never seemed to fit him – they have crazy long legs.

Zach’s color is starting to return when Chris gets back to him, and he stands up easily. “I don’t need help.”

“Maybe not, but I need to help you.”

“Aftercare, huh?”

“I would bandage you if I could.”

A ghost of a smirk crosses Zach’s face, but dies quickly. He pulls on the clothes and Chris, once he’s sure Zach can do it himself, puts his own track pants back on.

“What now?” Zach asks. He’s still shivering.

“Lie down. Here.” Chris pulls back the sheets and Zach falls into the bed gratefully.

It’s nearly five now. Chris gets in next to Zach and they wrap around each other.

“This isn’t working,” Zach says.

“It’s working right now. Right here. When we don’t think about the extraneous stuff.”

“It’s not enough for it to work here and now, though. The extraneous stuff is the actual relationship.”

Chris doesn’t want to hear it, not now. “I’m sorry I did that to you. I kind of hate myself now.”

“I’m sorry I agreed to do it. And I…kind of hate you too.” But Zach smiles, and Chris snorts, relieved. “But I kind of hate me too. How did it get all twisted up?”

Chris ignores that. “Are you going to flop all over me in your sleep?”

Zach stiffens slightly. “I’ll try not to.”

“I want you to. And you can do that weird nose thing if you want.”

Chris turns over, pulling Zach’s arms into position. Zach sighs, but buries his nose uncomfortably under Chris’s neck.

Chris sleeps, but not long enough. He wakes to find Zach watching him, grave and frowning.

“You’re here.” Chris smiles.

“I shouldn’t be.” He rolls over, saying, “I’m gonna go, I’ll –”

“Zach.” Chris grabs at him. “We need to talk. Stay.”

“I don’t think there’s much point,” Zach says miserably.

“What are you talking about?” Chris feels his heart steadily picking up pace. He went to sleep happy, and this is what he wakes up to?

Zach pulls away and kicks his way out of the sheets. “There’s no point if you don’t love me anymore. And that's okay, really, but I should -”

“Where on _earth_ did you get – oh.” Chris squeezes his eyes shut and wishes he could shut out his own words, replaying through his mind. _Those were acts of love between us, and that’s gone now. So, really, Zach. I have no idea why you would think I’d want to do that with you_. “I was just _saying_ that. To hurt you.”

“To hurt me?”

“Yes. I’m sorry. I was aiming for mild jerk but it got a bit out of control and ended up at total asshole.” Chris feels his cheeks heat up with shame. _That was real cruelty._ “Of course I love you. I wish I didn’t, because everything would be easier, but I still love you.”

“You still love me?” If Zach were a cartoon, Chris thinks, he’d have little red hearts floating around him like bubbles right now. He nods, and Zach takes a deep breath. “That changes _everything_.”

“I don’t exactly see how, but if it means you’ll stay and talk, okay.”

“Because if we both love each other we should get back together.”

Chris wills himself not to laugh. “Zach. Loving someone is not a reason to get back together. Unless both of us make some major changes, there’s no _point_ in getting back together. If the same problems keep recurring –”

“But they _won’t_. I promise! I’ll never act like that again, I’ll never say anything like that again, and I’ll go to therapy and–”

“Zach, come on. We didn’t break up just because of that night.”

“We didn’t?”

Chris stares at him in wonder. Zach looks genuinely puzzled. Sometimes, he really is unbelievably naïve. “We didn’t. We had problems long before then, and – and we never managed to fix them, not really, even with an Honesty Policy, and the long distance didn’t help, even with all the rules…it just didn’t work. I don’t know why, but it didn’t. But it wasn’t just you. I had my own issues. I _have_ my own issues.”

“You don’t have to be kind to me.”

“I’m not. You were right about some things. I _do_ have a lack of self-preservation, and I _do_ have anger issues. And I jump into things before I really think them through.”

“Like this relationship?”

Chris can’t answer that. He doesn’t know what the answer is. “This relationship has changed me,” he says at last. “I will never be the same again. It’s like you, with your tattoo. Indelible. Although you can get that removed.”

“I would never get it removed.” Chris’s heart aches to hear Zach’s voice cracking. “If nothing else, it’s a reminder that for a little while I was a functioning member of the human race.” He gives a broken smile. “Is there any hope for us?”

Chris feels like he’s teetering on the brink of something, like he does in subspace sometimes, the canyon beneath his feet and a choice to jump forward or pull back. He has to make a decision sooner or later, which way to fall.

“I’m not sure,” he says. “But I think we need to talk. _Really_ talk. When are you flying back to New York?”

Zach glances at the clock. “I have to be at the airport in five hours.”

Five hours. It’s as good as any other arbitrary deadline. “Then let’s get started.”

“Okay.” Zach slides back into the bed slowly. “Just one thing first – ground rule. Are you really going to kick me out if I say the T-word?”

Chris frowns, and then smiles as he understands. “No, Zach. Not today. Today you can therapize as much as you like.”

They both laugh, but it’s not quite normal. Things are still on edge.

“So,” Chris says. “You can go first. Age before beauty.”

Zach rolls his eyes. And he begins to talk.


End file.
